Trauma, My Neighborhood, and Redemption
Many of you know that I work with people who have, on a reoccurring basis, learned how to deal with deep loss. Family members killed, being taken hostage, rape, abandonment – you name it and many of my friends in the neighborhood have experienced it. Though I hang out all the time with friends who have been marked by such experiences, I can’t seem to fully understand the effects of such a sin scarred world.
On Saturday morning there was a vicious murder right across the street from Arlington Estates apartments where I spend a good portion of my time. A Karen man came home to find his wife with another man and brutally killed him. He stabbed his wife in the eyes blinding her, right in front of their five year old daughter. Fifteen or so people from two different apartments gathered outside to try and escape the horror.
Two days prior, a friend of mine told me how the police shot and killed a man who had been beating his wife. The police came to check it out when the abuser pulled a gun on the police. The police had no option but to kill him. Last week, a guy down the hall was allegedly beating the crap out of his wife.
The story of refugees is indeed traumatic. The refugee highway is surely a scar on world paved with tears, pain, and tragedy. As I pier across my neighborhood fever the last week I’m left a bit speechless. It is very easy for me to understand why so many people lose hope when their securing is in the hands of their culture, family, or some other form of the kingdom of this world. That Karen family who has been literally slaughtered has no option but to surrender everything to the hope and reality of Jesus. For me, I see no other option.
Probably more agonizing is that, when compared to the perfect and relentless love of Christ, I am just as guilty as the psycho Karen guy I described earlier. Before a holy, holy God I have the knife in my hands, dripping in my one guilty blood of pride, lust, selfishness, and greed. We all come to Jesus on these terms and in His great grace He makes us clean. He sees me now, not as a murderer, but as His son. Spotless. Justified. Healed. Whole. Maybe that is actually harder to comprehend than the evil in my neighborhood – that a perfect God would love a sinner like me.
In light of the entire trauma going on around here, I am driven to see people healed with the matchless love of Jesus. I need a lot of wisdom on how to navigate the gauntlet. But, I’m convinced that if the love of Jesus can break through to me, it can break through to anybody. May the grace and love of Jesus fill our streets like a mighty river and may the emotional, spiritual, and physical trauma of the refugee highway be erased by the blood of the Cross. How humbling it is that God continues to use hanging out with people, Spirit-enfused hanging out with people, to announce His Kingdom reign.
Beautiful. Tragedy and pain, then beauty. I wish we could have only beauty….But for whatever reason, we don’t. So…we see, look at, live among, live with (including within us) the tragedy and pain. But then we chase beauty. I believe the best beauty is in Christ.
Wow – that was what I thought as I started reading this. Then, again, towards the end – wow. John, don’t ever lose this gospel – that though our sins have stained us, God sees us as His sons. Thanks.